CHAPTER VIII

THE DUTCH CONQUEST

By the end of the sixteenth century Holland was practically independent, and the "Beggars of the Sea" were carrying her arms and trade all over the world. Numerous private companies of Dutch merchants made war against Spain on their own account, and great fortunes were made in the capture of Spanish fleets and in trade with Spanish and Portuguese colonies. The Dutch East India Company within a few years possessed itself of the better part of the Portuguese empire in the Indian Ocean, and the West India Company was organised to do the same in South America. Incorporated in 1621, it included various smaller companies already engaged in trade and privateering, and was an immense corporation which finally owned more than eight hundred ships, and sent to Brazil alone more than seventy thousand troops. Although protected, subsidised, and conceded a monopoly by the Dutch government, it always remained essentially a company for private profit.

The Company's primary object was to capture the Spanish treasure fleets; its secondary object was to conquer the possessions of Spain and Portugal in South America. Brazil furnished the best base for the operations that were intended to make the South Atlantic a Dutch lake; Bahia and Pernambuco were near Europe, had good harbours, lay on the direct route to the Plate and the Pacific, and from them Africa could be conveniently attacked. The sugar trade was a large thing in itself and the daring Dutch traders believed that the Portuguese colonists might welcome a deliverance from Spanish domination. Spain's power was a rotten sh.e.l.l, and impulses lying deep in the national spirit pushed the Dutch on to aggression. The peoples of Western Europe had finally felt all the stimulating influences of the Renaissance, of the Lutheran and Jesuit Reformations, and of the Era of Discovery. It was the epoch of the Thirty Years' War, of the League of Avignon, and of that confused fighting caused by the more vigorous peoples grasping for a share of the spoils of the New World.

In 1623 news came of the equipping by the West India Company of an expedition whose destination was manifestly to be Bahia. The Spanish government took no measures for defence. The local authorities half-heartedly began to fortify the city, but there were no troops except militia to man the works, and when the Dutch fleet hove in sight a panic ensued. The governor was captured, but many of the inhabitants fled into the back country, and a guerrilla warfare was kept up which shut up the Dutch inside the fortifications. They made use of their time in improving the defences, and soon made Bahia the best fortress in South America.

The news of the capture created consternation in Lisbon. Great exertions were made by the Portuguese merchants, as well as by the Spanish government, and the most formidable armament which up to that time had crossed the equator was prepared. It was composed of fifty-two ships and of twelve thousand men--the latter being mercenaries gathered from every country in Europe. The Dutch commander had not yet been re-enforced and made little resistance when such an overwhelming force arrived in Bahia harbour. He surrendered with the honours of war and the Spanish fleet retired. In a few weeks another Dutch fleet appeared, bringing provisions and re-enforcements. It was too late, however, and the Dutch did not venture to attack an enemy whom they themselves had furnished with such excellent re-enforcements. The Dutch, driven from the land, remained undisputed masters of the sea, and the Spanish and Portuguese could no longer trade except in convoys. In 1627 the celebrated Piet Heyn--the Dutch Sir Francis Drake--sailed boldly into Bahia harbour, and despising the fire of the forty guns of the forts, captured twenty-six ships within pistol-shot of the sh.o.r.e cannon. He ran his own ship right in between the two best Portuguese men-of-war, the forts did not dare fire for fear of wounding their own men, the Portuguese flagship was sunk, and the rest surrendered in terror. Among the spoils were three thousand hogsheads of sugar, which Piet Heyn sent home at his leisure, while he ravaged the sh.o.r.es of the bay. The following year he fell in with the Mexican treasure fleet and captured it bodily. This was the greatest capture ever made at sea. The West India Company declared a dividend of fifty per cent. after paying the expenses of the unsuccessful Bahia expedition, and resumed its plans of conquest with more vigour than ever.

[Ill.u.s.tration: OLD FORT AT BAHIA.]

After careful consideration Pernambuco was selected as a more vulnerable point of attack than Bahia. The fortifications were feeble, and there were numerous Jewish merchants in the city whose friendship could be counted on. Once more the Spanish government did nothing to avert the threatened blow, and in February, 1630, a Dutch fleet of fifty sail with seven thousand men arrived in front of Pernambuco. Three thousand men were landed to the north of the town and easily defeated the militia which tried to prevent their taking the place from the rear. The inhabitants fled to the interior, and after a creditable resistance the forts fell. The property captured was estimated at near ten million dollars. In the meantime, Albuquerque, the Brazilian commander, had retired to a defensible ranch commanding the road between Recife and Olinda, and whence communication could be kept up with the sea by way of Cape St. Augustine. This ranch is celebrated in Brazilian tradition as the "Arraial de Bom Jesus." The Brazilians rallied and from this vantage-ground began to hara.s.s the Dutch. The promises of commercial, religious, and political tolerance had produced little effect on the more ardent spirits. The Indians remained faithful to the Portuguese, and with the negroes did good service in the guerrilla warfare. For the first two years the Dutch could accomplish little except to improve the fortifications around the town, and the Brazilians acquired a confidence in their own ability to make head against regular troops which later stood them in good stead.

In 1631 a fleet of twenty ships appeared from Spain, but the Dutch Admiral sailed boldly out and gave them battle. The net results to the Spaniards were the landing of only a thousand men, who, after some difficulty, joined the militia at Bom Jesus. But the seeds of discontent were germinating among the Brazilians. On closer contact the heretics proved to be human. The planters wanted peace and an opportunity to sell their sugar. The Indians, negroes, and other adventurous spirits composing the guerrilla bands robbed both friend and foe. The soldiers were tired of serving without pay. A half-breed named Calabar, a man of remarkable bravery, cunning, and skill in woodcraft, deserted to the Dutch and gave them valuable a.s.sistance. Re-enforcements came from Holland, and under Calabar's guidance the Dutch learned the value of ambuscading and made sudden expeditions which took the important settlements by surprise.

In 1633 two special representatives of the Company came with instructions to prosecute the war vigorously and to endeavour to conciliate the Brazilians. The latters' resistance weakened; many of Albuquerque's volunteers deserted; the Dutch expeditions up and down the coast were successful. The island of Itamarica, Rio Grande do Norte, Parahyba, and the settlements in Alagoas were successively reduced.

Resistance was soon confined to the country just back of Pernambuco itself, and in 1635 the last posts which held out--Bom Jesus and St.

Augustine--surrendered. The whole coast from the San Francisco River north to Cape St. Roque was in the hands of the Dutch. There was nothing for it but submission or emigration. Many laid down their arms, but Albuquerque and his faithful lieutenants, the negro Dias and the Indian Camarro, reluctantly took their way toward Bahia, the only place of refuge. The Brazilian historians claim that ten thousand Pernambucanos, men, women, and children, accompanied Albuquerque, preferring to leave their homes, property, and friends rather than accept the foreign and heretic yoke. A sweet bit of revenge awaited them on their journey.

Encountering and overpowering a small Dutch garrison at Porto Calvo, they took its members prisoners, and among them found the traitor, Calabar. Him they hanged, while the Dutchmen were let go unharmed.

When Albuquerque reached the San Francisco he was replaced by a Spaniard, Rojas, who had brought re-enforcements of seventeen hundred Spanish troops. The new commander gave battle to the Hollanders, but in the first action was utterly defeated and lost his own life. For the next two years Pernambuco was ravaged by the most frightful burnings and ma.s.sacres. The Spanish mercenaries and the bands of negroes and Indians scoured the interior, and the Dutch retaliated with the same methods.

The prosperous colony was fast being depopulated and its industries ruined. It became manifest that a policy at once vigorous and conciliatory was necessary, and the Company determined to send out a governor-general with vice-regal powers.

The merchants of the Directory chose Count John Maurice, of Na.s.sau-Siegen, a scion of the reigning house, and a descendant of William the Silent. A more fortunate selection could not have been made.

Though only thirty-two years old, Count Maurice had already proved himself a brave and skilful soldier; he was a man of culture, a thorough son of the Renaissance, a lover of the arts, and, like most of his house, religiously tolerant and liberal to an extent extraordinary for that bitter age. He was one of those few spirits, in advance of their time, to whom Catholic and Protestant, Jew and Gentile were the same--to whose instincts religious and commercial intolerance was repugnant.

He arrived in 1637, and his keen eye at once saw that the two obstacles to pacification were the military raids which the new Spanish commander, Bagnuoli, was directing from his position near the San Francisco; and the fear of the Pernambuco sugar planters that Dutch dominion meant their forcible conversion to Calvinism. The Dutch troops were now well equipped and seasoned for warfare in the tropical woods, and their officers had learned how to exercise their trade under these difficult circ.u.mstances with all the coolness, shrewdness, and steadiness of their race. Commanded by Maurice they easily inflicted a crushing defeat upon the motley crew Bagnuoli had been able to gather. The whole country north of the San Francisco fell into Maurice's hands, and he crossed that river and destroyed the Brazilian base of supplies in Sergipe. The next year he was ordered by the Directory to attack Bahia with insufficient forces, and was compelled to retire after a forty-days siege. Two years later, however, his fleet defeated and nearly destroyed the largest naval force Spain had sent out since the Invincible Armada.

Of the six thousand soldiers on board who had been expected to drive him from Brazil, only one thousand were landed, away north of Cape St.

Roque, whence they barely managed to reach Bahia after a march of over a thousand miles through the wilderness, suffering the most frightful hardships. Maurice followed up this victory by occupying Sergipe (1640) and Maranho (1641). Ceara had fallen into his hands in 1637. The whole of Brazil from the 3rd to the 12th degree of lat.i.tude, a solid body of territory containing more than two-thirds of the population and developed resources, was apparently irretrievably lost to the Portuguese. They only retained Bahia and the isolated settlements in Para and the southern provinces.

In internal administration Maurice was equally vigorous. He suppressed the exactions of Dutch soldiers and functionaries, and established law, order, and justice. Agriculture, industry, and commerce flourished as never before. He found Recife a miserable port village and left it a city of two thousand houses. He does not seem to have made any especial exertions to secure Dutch immigration. The Brazilians were not displaced as landed proprietors, and most of the plantations confiscated from the persistently rebellious were resold to Brazilians who accepted the Dutch rule. He permitted to Romanists and Jews the free and public exercise of their faith. Many Jews came to Pernambuco, and with their characteristic capacity soon became prominent and useful in the commercial life of the colony. The courts were so organised as to secure representation for Brazilians. He summoned a sort of legislature of the princ.i.p.al colonists--the first representative a.s.sembly on South American soil--and put into effect the measures it proposed. Local administration was entrusted to Brazilians, and his aim was evidently to make the colony self-governing.

But this positivist of the seventeenth century, this genial pagan who had caught the essential spirit of the Renaissance and had the courage to put it into practice centuries before it became dominant even in the realm of thought, was too far in advance of his time. His countrymen could not understand him or his ideas, and the Portuguese colonists were equally incapable of appreciating what he was trying to do for them. His edifice scattered like a card house the moment he left. To all appearances every vestige of his work was swept away; it is only a memory and an example; a wave that dashed far up the beach at the beginning of the flood-tide, leaving a mark that long served only to show how far the water had once come. It remained for the nineteenth century and another nation of shopmen to put into practice, on a scale large enough to convince the world, the great principle of non-interference by the central government with the religious beliefs and the local self-government of colonies.

The moneyed aristocrats of the West India Company distrusted Maurice as a member of a reigning family which was maintained in power by its popularity with the ma.s.ses. The Directory wanted immediate profits, not an empire established on a broad and sure foundation. In their hearts they preferred a steward and bookkeeper to a prince and a statesman. The Calvinist clergy bitterly complained of the liberties conceded their Catholic compet.i.tors for t.i.thes, and succeeded in imposing on Maurice the execution of the prohibition against religious processions--then as now so dear to the Brazilian heart. Spies were sent out to report on him and he was continually hampered.

Among the Brazilians he was equally misunderstood. While personally so popular that not one of their chroniclers has a word of dispraise for him, they could not forget that he was of a different race and religion, and he did not succeed in converting them to his ideas. His best personal friends were among those most influential, after his departure, in stirring up the exclusive Brazilian feeling.

Maurice was not a man to be easily daunted. For seven years he remained in office, fighting the Directory, the Calvinist ministers, the corrupt officials, trying to reconcile the jealousies between Dutchmen and Brazilians, and to create a h.o.m.ogeneous community. But after the power of the Na.s.sau family began to decline with the rise of the Witt oligarchy, the Directory determined to be rid of him. In 1644 he made a vigorous demand for more troops, and when it was refused sent in a Bismarckian resignation, which, to his surprise, was immediately accepted with many polite protestations of thanks for his services.

CHAPTER IX

EXPULSION OF THE DUTCH

Four years before Maurice's retirement Portugal broke loose from Spain, and that part of Brazil which had escaped conquest by the Dutch promptly threw off the Spanish yoke. In Europe Holland and the new Portugal were naturally in alliance, but the former was not magnanimous enough to stop her aggressions in Brazil, and the latter was too weak to resent them.

Among the Brazilians dissatisfaction began to brew as soon as Maurice left. The prohibition of religious processions, the severe financial crisis among planters who were unable to pay off the heavy mortgages which they had given when they purchased confiscated plantations, the low price of sugar, and the impulse to national feeling given by the news of the success of the mother country in achieving independence all co-operated.

The opportunity brought forth the man. The head of the rebellion was John Fernandes Vieira, who is the great creator of the Brazilian nationality. A native of Madeira, he ran away as a boy to seek his fortune in Brazil. Engaged at first in menial employments, his honesty and capacity soon enabled him to strike out for himself as a sugar planter. When the Dutch attacked Pernambuco in 1630 he took up arms, and only surrendered when Bom Jesus fell. Convinced that further resistance was useless he returned to his business and within ten years was the richest man in the colony. Though a devoted Catholic and a patriotic Portuguese, he was one of Maurice's most trusted advisers. When the Prince departed John Fernandes thenceforward devoted his life to the expulsion of the Dutch.

The first revolt occurred in Maranho, where the small Dutch garrison had to abandon that captaincy as early as 1644. In Pernambuco John Fernandes organised a formidable conspiracy, and letters were despatched to the new Portuguese king asking his aid. John IV. did not dare to comply openly, for such action might have involved him in a war with the States-General, but the governor-general at Bahia was as unscrupulous as he was patriotic, and secretly afforded the conspirators every facility in his power. The celebrated chiefs of the guerrilla fighting of 1630 to 1635, Vidal, Camarro, and Dias, were only too anxious to have another chance, and gathered their bands in the wilderness. Arms were obtained from Bahia, and in 1645 the insurrection broke out. The first move was to have been the ma.s.sacre of the princ.i.p.al Hollanders, but the plot was discovered and the conspirators fled for their lives to the interior. At a place called Tabocas John Fernandes gathered a motley crew of a few hundred together. Only three hundred of his followers had muskets, but they were protected by marshy ground in front, and the hill was surrounded by almost impenetrable cane-brakes. There on the 3rd of August the Dutch troops to the number of a thousand found and attacked the Brazilians. The bulk of the population was standing aloof, his camp was full of mutiny, nevertheless John Fernandes stood firm. The Dutch charged confidently, but they could not use their firearms to advantage, and the Brazilians showed the traditional valour of their race in the use of pike and sword. The Dutch were not able to dislodge the rebels, and after losing three hundred and seventy men they retreated to Pernambuco, leaving the insurgents with all the moral prestige of victory.

The whole province rose; the troops, which had come from Bahia ostensibly to aid the Dutch in pacifying the province, went over _en ma.s.se_ to the patriots; the Dutch garrisons in the outlying towns were everywhere attacked and everywhere retreated. A few grudgingly paid mercenaries were not the material with which to defend such an empire.

Within a few months the Dutch were expelled from the interior and shut themselves up in the fortified seaports waiting for re-enforcements. The Indians and guerrillas spread fire and destruction through Itamarica, Parahyba, Rio Grande do Norte, and Ceara. In spite of this sudden success the position of the patriots was very critical. Without the aid of regular troops they could hardly hope to make head against the Dutch so soon as the latter received adequate re-enforcements. The news of the insurrection aroused great indignation in Holland. The house of the Portuguese amba.s.sador was surrounded by an infuriated mob, and his government had to disavow the rebellion. Willing as John IV. might be to help the Brazilians, he dare not. By the middle of 1646 an able commander, von Schoppke, arrived from Holland with a fine army. At first John Fernandes and the militia did not dare meet him in the field. The provincials hovered about the Dutch columns, cutting off detachments, and burning sugar plantations in the line of march. John Fernandes set the example by ordering the destruction of his own property.

In 1647 Barreto de Menezes, an able professional soldier, arrived in Brazil bearing a secret commission from the Portuguese king. The bickering and despairing provincials made no difficulty about recognising it, and Barreto at once began uniting the scattered militia bands and the few regulars who had clandestinely come up from Bahia.

A few miles south of Pernambuco the low hills encroach on the coast-plain, leaving only a narrow pa.s.s between themselves and the marshes. Schoppke made a sortie along the coast road with the largest part of his force,--about four thousand men,--and there at the hills of Guararapes found the patriot army, numbering two thousand two hundred.

Encamped across the level ground they barred his way, with the evident intention of giving him battle, and there on the 18th of August, 1648, was fought out the question whether Brazil should be Dutch or Portuguese. The defeat of the patriots would have meant the hopeless collapse of the rebellion and the giving up by poor little Portugal of the last vestige of her claim to Brazil. Success meant that they might prolong the war for years and finally tire out Holland, or give the Portuguese government a chance to do something by negotiation.

The battle began with the Dutch taking possession of the higher ground whence their artillery inflicted some damage, but when they charged down the hill, attempting to outflank and surround the Brazilians, there ensued a confused and desperate struggle with cold steel. The regulars proved no match for these farmers, who were fighting for their homes and religion. The Dutch battalions broke and fled up the hill, followed by the Brazilians. Then the Dutch reserve came into action and the battle rolled back to the low ground, where the result was decided face to face and man to man. Some of the braver of the Dutch imprudently went through the Brazilian lines into the marshes, where they suffered terrible slaughter at the hands of the reserve. More than a thousand Hollanders perished, with seventy-four officers. Thirty-three standards remained in the hands of the Brazilians, and the remnants of the Dutch army fled to the shelter of the walls of Pernambuco. The cowardice shown by many of his troops is the only excuse offered by the Dutch general for this shameful defeat suffered at the hands of a militia inferior not only in equipment and artillery, but in numbers and advantage of position.

The descendants of the victors at Guararapes have never forgotten that it was a Brazilian and not a Portuguese triumph. The Brazilians proved to their own satisfaction that their resources were sufficient to defend their inst.i.tutions, and it has been well said that on that day the Brazilian nation was born.

The parsimonious merchants whose money was invested in the Company made a half-hearted effort to retrieve this unexpected reverse, but re-enforcements were sent out so grudgingly that a similar sortie next year was even more overwhelmingly defeated at the very same place. Even then the Brazilian hopes of ultimate success would have been small if at this very juncture the world-power of Holland had not received its first great check by the breaking out of the war with Oliver Cromwell. With English fleets sweeping the North Sea and Blake's cannon thundering at the Texel, the States-General had no forces to spare on far-away Brazil.

The patriots kept the Dutch shut up in Pernambuco and were undisputed masters of the rest of the province. So long as communication by sea remained open the Dutch, however, could maintain themselves indefinitely. Re-enforcements might come at any time from Holland and the negotiations by Portugal were uncertain, and might, indeed, lead to Brazil's being exchanged for an advantage elsewhere.

John Fernandes steadfastly maintained the siege, urging his followers not to lay down their arms so long as a Dutchman remained in Brazil. The pusillanimous Portuguese king did not dare help the Pernambucanos, and neither was he honest enough to abide by the treaties he had made with Holland, giving up all claim to North Brazil. Matters remained in this anomalous position until 1654, when John Fernandes by a single audacious stroke cut through the tangle made by complicated and timid European diplomacy.

In the fall of 1653 the annual Bahia fleet sailed from the Tagus, convoyed by powerful men-of-war. The Dutch had no naval force on the South American coast able to cope with it. When the Portuguese fleet hove in sight of Pernambuco, the Brazilian commanders from their fortified besieging camp just to the south of the city entered into communication with the Admiral. John Fernandes begged the latter to lend him some cannon for a few days and meanwhile to blockade the port. The patriot leader saw that the isolated garrison of mercenaries would have no heart to hold out for long. The Portuguese Admiral refused, saying, truly enough, that he had no instructions to aid the insurgent Brazilians, and that he did not care to risk his head by precipitating a war between Portugal and Holland. Fernandes answered that with or without his aid the a.s.sault would be made, and the Admiral yielded to his natural feelings and lent the Brazilians some big guns. John Fernandes planted them where they commanded an outlying fort he knew to be vital to the city's defences. Schoppke was compelled to retire within the central city; the Brazilians made successful night a.s.saults on several positions, and drew their lines closer and closer until the place was untenable. On the 26th of January, 1655, the Dutch general signed a capitulation, surrendering not only Pernambuco, but all the other places held by the Dutch in Brazil. His twelve hundred troops were given safe pa.s.sage home, and all resident Hollanders were allowed three months to settle their affairs before leaving.

Thus ended the Dutch dominion in Brazil. Four provinces, three cities, eight towns, fourteen fortified places, and three hundred leagues of coast were definitely restored to the Portuguese Crown. A gigantic commercial speculation had failed before the obstinate resistance of a few farmers animated by a love of country and religion. Twenty-five years of b.l.o.o.d.y warfare or sulky acquiescence in alien rule had welded the Portuguese colonists along the Brazilian coast into a nation.

Directly from the Dutch they had learned little or nothing. Rather were the traits which have ever since been the cause of Brazil's industrial backwardness intensified.

The characteristics of the leaders in the Pernambuco war of independence epitomise the races of Brazil. Vidal is the type of a high-cla.s.s Brazilian--generous, jealous, spendthrift, proud, intelligent, quick at expedients, and not too scrupulous in his use of them. Camarro, the Indian, perished before the final victory as if to show symbolically that his race had not the stamina to hold out in compet.i.tion with white or black. Dias represents the negro--unsurpa.s.sable in fidelity and personal courage, and needing only leadership to show transcendent military qualities.

John Fernandes was a curious mixture of the mediaeval and modern. His wealth did not make him cautious where his country was concerned; he had been honoured with the intimate confidence of those whom he fought; he was grave, silent, reserved, strongest when others were most discouraged; no feeling of vanity ever interfered with his purposes; if another man could do a piece of work better than he, he stepped aside; when success was in sight he imperturbably let showier men have the glory. Religious faith and feudal loyalty were the mainsprings of his nature; nevertheless in war he was cautious, indefatigable, and calculating. In crises he struck like a sledge-hammer, though he could wait patiently and uncomplainingly for an opportunity. His was not a pride that disdains artifices. He conspired secretly and subtly, and with all his apparent moderation of character he blindly and unreasoningly hated everything Protestant and non-Portuguese. On the hill at Tabocas his battle-cry was: "Portuguese! At the heretics! G.o.d is with us!" When the Dutch made their last desperate charge, and it seemed as if all was up with his band of insurgents, he refused to flee, but stood beside the crucifix, calling on the Virgin and the saints, and exhorting his companions to die rather than yield to the unbelievers.

When the Dutch gave back he fell on his knees and intoned a hymn. With each new victory gained he vowed a church to the Virgin. When desperate over the hesitation of the Admiral in the last scene of the war, his final argument, made in all sincerity, was that failure to expel the Dutch meant exposing thousands of Catholics to the temptation of denying their faith by a renewal of the heretic rule, and that for himself, rather than share the responsibility for the murder of thousands of souls, he would lead his Brazilians to certain death.

Relentless to his enemies, to his friends and dependents he was kindness itself. It is related that a Portuguese, landed with hardly clothes enough to cover him, and seeking a protector, was directed to Fernandes.

The latter was mounting his horse to go on a journey. To the man's offer of allegiance and appeal for help, he answered: "I am going to my house ten miles away and have no leisure now to relieve you, but follow me thither on foot. If you are too weak to walk, take this horse I am on.

If you are faithful you shall have support as long as my means hold out; if they fail, and there should be nothing else to eat, I will cut off a leg and we will eat it together." This was said with so grave a face and severe a manner that the poor Portuguese thought he meant to repulse him. But on inquiry he found that Fernandes rarely smiled and that literally all that he had was at the service of his adherents.

CHAPTER X

THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

In 1621 the northern provinces, Ceara, Maranho, and Para, had been separated from the rest of Brazil and erected into an independent government called the State of Maranho. In Ceara the cattle-industry flourished; around the beautiful bay of Maranho the Azoreans multiplied their colonies. Cotton, mandioc, and sugar were grown in large quant.i.ties; the cotton manufacture soon became an important industry.